Some of the Earth’s tiniest naturally occurring particles may have just bred a big mess for climatologists. New findings reveal that models scientists have long used to estimate the causes and effects of global warming may be dramatically flawed due to errors in one of their most important inputs.
These conclusions are found in a new study published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by Jasper Kok, a climatology researcher with The National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).
I. Recent Warming – Blame it on the Sun?
The study’s key conclusion was to show that the ratio of small soil dust particles (clay), which cool the atmosphere, to large soil dust particles (silt), which yield an indirect heating effect, may be much higher than previous estimated. This is a critical finding because it shows that the Earth’s climate may be much more sensitive to solar radiation than previous models have indicated, which in turn casts doubt on anthropogenic warming theory — the idea that human carbon dioxide emissions bear the primary warming influence on the climate over the last several decades.
Carbon dioxide, like water vapor, has been shown unquestionably to be a greenhouse gas with some effect on the atmosphere. And human behavior (direct — via burning fossil fuels, and indirect — via livestock and clearing vegetation) has caused atmospheric CO2 levels to creep upwards over the last half century.
That said, levels still remain drastically lower than in certain periods of the Earth’s early history. Furthermore, it is exactly what impact these slightly elevated CO2 levels are having in terms of warming. While it would be quick to claim causation, due to the correlation in recently rising temperatures, the exact degree of causation — if at all — remains unknown.
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=20516
h/t to Marc Morano
Hmm, must be a conspiracy. It always seems to come back to that big fireball in the sky as a source for warming. How can this be?
“This is a critical finding because it shows that the Earth’s climate may be much more sensitive to solar radiation than previous models have indicated, which in turn casts doubt on anthropogenic warming theory”
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Models themselves actually indicate no such thing. All they do is undertake vast numbers of calculations based on the sensitivity figures input by human beings. If those figures are incorrect, the models are worthless.
The models have been worthless since they hitched the models to CO2 as a GHG being the primary driving factor for recent climate changes! Sometime in the 70s!
WTF? Has the world turned upside down? This came from NCAR? Does Trenberth know about this Heresy? Or maybe this is part of the haze of Warmer/Skeptic press releases they’ll use to CTA when the NH enters the deep freeze at the next minima?
We’re now in La Nina, but on the gentle upswing to 55 max sunspots. We don’t really know what controls the propensity of La Nina vs El Nino. Is it a range of frequencies we don’t monitor? But God help us when we return to minima after this cycle. It’s likely to be bad, and worsen thru the minima after cycle 25.
I’m moving to Florida…
This article has just been substantially changed the opening paras now read:
“Some of the Earth’s tiniest naturally occurring particles may play a much different role in global climate change than previously thought. New findings reveal that models scientists have long used to estimate the causes and effects of global warming may be flawed due to errors in one of their significant inputs — atmospheric dust.
“This revelation is an indirect conclusion of a new study published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by Jasper Kok, a climatology researcher with The National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).
“The study’s key conclusion was to show that the ratio of small soil dust particles (clay), which cool the atmosphere, to large soil dust particles (silt), which may heat or cool depending on their size, may be much lower than previous estimated using empirical (observation based models). While the number of small dust particles, according to our discussion with Professor Kok, is approximately the same as previously thought, the number of large particles are much higher.
“This is a critical finding because it means that current global circulation models (GCMs) used in broader climate change models, may significantly overestimate the net cooling effect per volume of dust (given the greater occurrence of large silt, which favors heating). The overestimation of the cooling is reported especially high at the top of the atmosphere (TOA), where it may be overestimated by as much as a factor of 15.
“It is also critical as these large silt particles tend to precipitate and can play an important role of accelerating glacial melting. Thus atmospheric dust may not only warm the earth more than previously estimated, but may also lead directly to one of the observed effects often associated with climate change — glacial melting.”
The reason given for the change:
Update: Dec 31, 2010 11:10 a.m.-
“We had a lengthy discussion with Professor Kok to clarify a couple of conclusions that the NSF press release seemed to be pointing at. Most importantly, Professor Kok explained to us that the levels of small dust was not less than previously expected, rather they were the same and the levels of large dust were higher.
“He also explained that solar variance (generally within the range of +/- 0.1 percent of total energy transfered into the atmosphere) and dust’s reflectivity (about +/- 0.3 percent of total energy transfered into the atmosphere) indicate that any correlation between dust and the impact of solar activity would be very weak (around 3 ppm). At 3000 ppm, dust’s direct effects via atmospheric dust levels are the more important topic to look at, as confirmed by our further discussions with Professor Kok.
“That said the key conclusion of this article — that warming models need to be re-run with accurate dust info or risk offering misleading conclusions — still stands, albeit via a different mechanism than we previously thought. We apologize for the confusion concerning the relationship between solar activity and dust levels.
“We’d also like to thank Professor Kok for taking the time to discuss some of this study’s finer points. We’re looking forward to doing an interview with him on the topic of climate modeling in the near future.”